Calypso

Mitar Tarabich, Serbian Prophet

by Jura Sever

Mitar Tarabich, (1829-1899) an illiterate peasant from a small Serbian village called Kremna, had experienced occasional prophetic visions. Being a religious person and having a local Serbian orthodox priest for a godfather, he told this priest about his episodes of “seeing into the future.” The priest, Zaharije Zaharich (1836-1918), wrote down everything in a small notebook, which was damaged by fire in 1943 when his family house was destroyed by the occupying Bulgarian army. This text is now in the possession of the family of Zaharich’s great-grandson, Mr. Dejan Malenkovich.

Tarabich’s best-known prophecy has to do with a series of political events in 19th century Serbia. Without details here, he predicted a sequence of events (spanning a course of decades) that eventually led to the removal of the ruling Obrenovich family from the Serbian royal throne. This prophecy came to be known in the region as the “black prophecy” and it did play out as predicted. It culminated in 1903 with the assassination of Alexandar Obrenovich and his wife Draga, who were killed by their own guards.

Ed: I’ve omitted all text preceding the end of WWII. Predictions from WWI through WWII were quite accurate, and the author followed them up with now historical facts.]: You should note that Tarabich’s words are actually translated from Serbo-Croatian, and that the translation is not necessarily in its final form. You may notice that some of the phrasing in the quotes is awkward and rough; this is an accurate reflection of his rural accent. Tarabich’s words come from conversations with his godfather Zaharich — so you should be aware that any references to “you” or “your descendants” relate to Zaharich specifically. When Tarabich says “us” he means the Serbs, but he does not distinguish between Croats, Serbs, Slovenians, etc. To him, anyone who spoke his language was a Serb. Perhaps it is also important to note that we don’t really know how much of Tarabich’s prophecy was influenced by his own opinion; what I mean is that some of the adjectives used to describe the people and events he saw could be a reflection of his “peasant-like” interpretation of those events (examples: intelligent, brave, honest, horrible, calamity, etc.).

Predictions

“After the Great War peace will reign all over the world. Many new states will appear… black, white, red and yellow. An international court is formed, which does not allow countries to fight each other. This Court will be above all kings. Where a war starts, the Court will judge justly, trying to transform hatred and butchery into love and peace. The lucky ones who live to see these times will be more than happy.”

“After a while some great kings, as well as some small ones, will start to fake their respect for the Court, while doing whatever they please… Many small wars will begin because of this… thousands upon thousands will die, but there will be no big wars.”

“There will be a few wars around the kingdom of Israel, but sooner or later the peace will come even there. In these wars brothers fight brothers; then they make peace and kiss each other, but their hatred remains… All these small wars are initiated by the great kingdoms, because of their wickedness and malice; those who fight and butcher each other do it because of their blind stupidity.”

“In our country, the time of peace and prosperity will last for a long time. Many a generation will be born to live and die in peace, knowing about war only through wise books, words and different strange apparitions.”

“Our kingdom will be strong and well loved and respected by everybody. People will eat only white bread, and whole wheat just when they want to. Everybody will ride around in carts with no oxen. People will travel in the sky, looking down upon our land as if they had climbed on the doubled Tara mountain.”

“Serbia will prosper best while the man with blue eyes on a white horse governs, one who will come to Serbia bringing some kind of new religion. He will ascend our throne, and will be strong and healthy, living a long life close to one hundred years. He will very much like to hunt, and one time while hunting he will accidentally fall from his white horse and thus lose his leg. From this wound he will die, not because of his great age.”

“After him our land will be governed by some kind of commission, but it will never be as it was. Even though the people in our kingdom will forget about misery and hunger and will live in great wealth, brother will start to hate and think evil of brother.”

“On our borders and over them a new nation will appear. They will grow like grass after a deluge, they will be good and honest, and they will answer our hatred with reason. They will take care of each other like brothers. And we, because of our madness we shall think that we know everything and that we can do anything, and we shall baptize them with some new fate of ours, but all that will be in vain. Because they will believe only in themselves and in nobody else. Big trouble will become of it, because this nation will be brave.”

“Many summers this trouble will last, and nobody will be able to stop it, because that nation will grow like grass. One who will be born many summers after you [Note: he is speaking to the priest Zaharic here], will be honest and intelligent, he will deal with them in peace. We shall live in peace — they there, us here and there.”

When Tarabich says «they there, us here and there,» he might well be referring to the current situation in the region of Krajina (in Croatia). If you take the «them» to be the Croatians, then he’s saying that Croatians will live only in Croatia, while Serbs will live both in Serbia and Croatia (Krajina).

“You see my godfather, when the world starts to live in peace and abundance after the Second Big War, all of that will be just a bitter illusion, because many will forget God, and they will worship only their own human intelligence… And do you know my godfather, what is human intelligence compared to God’s will and knowledge? Not even a single drop in the ocean.

“Men will build a box and within will be some kind of gadget with images, but they will not be able to communicate with me already dead, even though this image gadget will be as close to this other world as hairs on the human scalp are close to each other. With the help of this image-gadget man will be able to see everything that is happening all over the world.”

“People will drill wells deep in the ground and dig out gold, which will give them light, speed and power, and the earth will shed tears of sorrow, because there will be much more gold and light on its surface than in its interior. The earth will suffer because of these open wounds. Instead of working in the fields, people will dig everywhere, in right and wrong places, but the real power will be all around them, not being able to tell them, ‘Come on, take me, don’t you see that I am here, all around you.’ Only after many a summer, people will remember this real power, and then they will realize how stupid it was to dig all those holes. This power will also be present in people but it will take a long time before they discover it and use it. Thus man will live for a long, long time, not being able to know himself. There will be many learned men who will think through their books that they know and can do everything. They will be the great obstacle for this realization [self-knowledge], but once men get this knowledge, then people will see what kind of delusion it was when they listened to their learned men. When that happens, people will be so sorry that they didn’t discover it before, because this knowledge is so simple.”

“People will do many stupid things, thinking that they know and can do everything, not knowing anything. Wise men will appear in the Orient, and their wisdom will cross all seas and frontiers, but people will not trust this wisdom for long time, and this real truth they will proclaim for a lie.

“Their souls will not be possessed by the Devil, but by something much worse. They will believe that their illusion is the real truth, although there will be no truth in their heads. Here at home it will be the same as all over the world. People will start to hate clean air and this divine freshness and all divine beauty and will hide in rankness. Nobody will force them to do that, but they will do it of their own free will.

“Here in Kremna many a field will become a meadow, and many a home will be abandoned, but then those who have left will come back to heal themselves by breathing fresh air. In Serbia it will not be possible to distinguish a man from a woman. Everybody will dress the same. This calamity will come to us from abroad but it will stay with us the longest. A groom will take a bride, but nobody will know who is who. People will be lost and more and more senseless day by day. Men will be born not knowing who was their grandfather and great-grandfather. People will think that they know everything, but not a thing they will know.”

“The Serbs will separate from each other, and they will say, “I am not a Serb; I am not a Serb.” The unholy one will infiltrate this nation and bed with Serbian sisters, mothers and wives. He will sire such children that among the Serbs, since the beginning of the world, these will be the worst of offspring. Only weaklings will be born, and nobody will be strong enough to give a birth to a real hero.”

“At one time we shall disappear from this land of ours. We shall go to the north, and then realizing our stupid deed we shall return. When we come back, we shall wise up and chase away the unholy one, not to see him, in God’s name, ever again.”

“The whole world will be plagued by a strange disease and nobody will be able to find a cure; everybody will say, “I know, I know, because I am learned and smart,” but nobody will know anything. People will think and think, but they will not be able to find the right cure, which will be with God’s help, all around them and in themselves.”

“Man will travel to other worlds to find lifeless deserts there, and still, God forgive him, he will think that he knows better than God himself. There, except the eternal peace of God, he will see nothing, but he will sense with his heart and soul all of God’s beauty and power. People will drive in rigs upon the moon and stars. They will look for life, but life similar to ours they will not find. It will be there, but they will not be able to understand it and see that it is life.

“One who goes there, God forgive him, not believing in God as it is proper for an honorable and decent person, when he comes back he will say, ‘Oh, you people, who mention God’s name with doubt, go there where I was, than you will see what is God’s mind and power.”

“The more people will know, the less they will love and care for each other. Hatred will be so great between them that they will care more for their different gadgets than for their relatives. Man will trust his gadget more than his first neighbor…”

“Among people of a nation far in the north, a little man will appear who will teach men about love and compassion, but there will be many hypocrites around him so that he will have many ups and downs. Not one of these hypocrites will want to know what is real human grace, but his wise books will remain, and all the words he will say [tape recordings?], and then people will see how self-deceived they were.

“Those who will read and write different books with numbers will think that they know the most. These learned men will let their lives be led by their calculations, and they will do and live exactly how these numbers tell them. Among these learned men there will be good and evil men. The evil ones will do evil deeds. They will poison air and water and spread pestilence over the seas, rivers and earth, and people will start to die suddenly of various ailments. Those good and wise will see that all this effort and hard work is not worth a penny and that it leads to the destruction of the world, and instead of looking for wisdom in numbers, they will start to seek it in meditation.

“When they start to meditate more, they will be closer to God’s wisdom, but it will be too late, because the evil ones will already ravage the whole earth and men will start to die in great numbers. Then people will run away from cities to the country and look for the mountains with three crosses, and there, inside, they will be able to breathe and drink water. Those who will escape will save themselves and their families, but not for long, because a great famine will appear. There will be plenty of food in towns and villages, but it will be poisoned. Many will eat because of hunger and die immediately. Those who will fast to the end will survive, because the Holy Ghost will save them and they will be close to God.”

“People waging this war will have their scientists who will invent different and strange cannon-balls. When they explode, these cannon-balls, instead of killing, will cast a spell over all that lives; people, armies and live stock. This spell will make them sleep, and sleep they will instead of fighting, and after they will come back to their senses.

“We [Serbia] will not fight in this war, but others will do battle over our heads. Burning people will fall from the sky over Pozega [a town in Serbia]. Only one country at the end of the world, surrounded by great seas, as big as our Europe, [Australia?] will live in peace, without any troubles… Upon it or over it not a single cannon-ball will explode!

“Those who will run and hide in the mountains with three crosses will find shelter and will be saved to live after in abundance, happiness and love, because there will be no more wars. “

Ragnarok

Found at The Realm of Myth, Legend, and Folktales.

It was a firm belief of the northern nations that a time would come when all the visible creation, the gods of Valhalla and Niffleheim, the inhabitants of Jotunheim, Alfheim, and Midgard, together with their habitations, would be destroyed. The fearful day of destruction will not, however, be without its forerunners.

First will come a triple winter, during which snow will fall from the four corners of the heavens, the frost be very severe, the wind piercing, the weather tempestuous, and the sun impart no gladness. Three such winters will pass away without being tempered by a single summer. Three other similar winters will then follow, during which war and discord will spread over the universe.

The earth itself will be frightened and begin to tremble, the sea leave its basin, the heavens tear asunder, and men perish in great numbers, and the eagles of the air feast upon their still quivering bodies.

The wolf Fenris will now break his bands, the Midgard serpent rise out of her bed in the sea, and Loki, released from his bonds, will join the enemies of the gods. Amidst the general devastation the sons of Muspelheim will rush forth under their leader Surtur, before and behind whom are flames and burning fire. Onward they ride over Bifrost, the rainbow bridge, which breaks under the horses’ hoofs. But they, disregarding its fall, direct their course to the battlefield called Vigrid. Thither also repair the wolf Fenris, the Midgard serpent, Loki with all the followers of Hela, and the Frost giants.

Heimdall now stands up and sounds the Giallar horn to assemble the gods and heroes for the contest. The gods advance, led on by Odin, who engages the wolf Fenris, but falls a victim to the monster, who is, however, slain by Vidar, Odin’s son. Thor gains great renown by killing the Midgard serpent, but recoils and falls dead, suffocated with the venom which the dying monster vomits over him. Loki and Heimdall meet and fight till they are both slain. The gods and their enemies having fallen in battle, Surtur, who has killed Freyr, darts fire and flames over the world, and the whole universe is burned up. The sun becomes dim, the earth sinks into the ocean, the stars fall from heaven, and time is no more.

After this Alfadur (the Almighty) will cause a new heaven and a new earth to arise out of the sea. The new earth filled with abundant supplies will spontaneously produce its fruits without labor or care. Wickedness and misery will no more be known, but the gods and men will live happily together.

Shambhala

The prophecy of Shambhala states that each of its kings will rule for 100 years. There will be 32 in all, and as their reigns pass, conditions in the outside world will deteriorate. Men will become more warlike and pursue power for its own sake, and an ideology of materialism will spread over the earth. When the “barbarians” who follow this ideology are united under an evil king and think there is nothing left to conquer, the mists will lift to reveal the icy mountains of Shambhala. The barbarians will attack Shambhala with a huge army equipped with terrible weapons. Then the 32nd king of Shambhala, Rudra Cakrin, will lead a mighty host against the invaders. In a last great battle, the evil king and his followers will be destroyed.